Tikker wristwatch tells you the ultimate time

Are you gearing up to plunge into a particularly challenging jigsaw puzzle, or maybe starting to read a very large book? If so, you may want to check the Tikker wristwatch, which estimates how long you have to live and provides a running countdown. Aside from reminding you of this ultimate deadline, its designers see the watch as conveying a message to slow down and appreciate life while you still have it.

The principle behind Tikker is very simple. It estimates your life expectancy based on a questionnaire and converts the answers into a countdown display in years, months, days, minutes, and seconds until your appointment with the Grim Reaper. It can even compensate for leap years.

This isn't meant as a morbid death vigil stretched out over (hopefully) decades, but rather the "death watch," as the designers have nicknamed it, is a way of making people appreciate life by breaking down the modern taboo about death.

“The occurrence of death is no surprise to anyone, but in our modern society we rarely talk about it," says Tikker creator Fredrik Colting. "I think that if we were more aware of our own expiration I’m sure we’d make better choices while we are alive.”

The idea behind Tikker started with Colting’s grandfather passed away. "It made me think about death and the transience of life, and I realized that nothing matters when you are dead. Instead what matters is what we do when we are alive."

The carpe diem thinking behind Tikker may be uplifting, but not all of us may desire to be reminded that we've been living on borrowed time since last Thursday.

Tikker is currently running a Kickstarter campaign through November 1 to raise funds to cover tooling and mechanical costs, ordering components, and assembly and testing, as well as ironing out final software and hardware problems. A US$39 pledge puts you in line for the Tikker.

David Szondy is a freelance writer based in Monroe, Washington. An award-winning playwright, he has contributed to Charged and iQ magazine and is the author of the website Tales of Future Past. All articles by David Szondy

wow.. i spend waaaay too much time thinking about our impending doom and the pointlessness of everything after that point.. this is the last thing I need... I can't think of this thing as anything more than a morbid reminder and a promoter of depression... I mean really???

Facebook User 13th October, 2013 @ 10:36 pm PDT

I think this watches stated purpose will be at odds with the impact it will have. If I had a watch with my ultimate deadline on it it would not encourage me to "slow down and appreciate life". It would constantly remind me that I do not have enough time to accomplish everything I'd like. This would have me moving and doing every possible second I could manage to squeeze out of every day trying to get everything done "in time".

VirtualGathis 14th October, 2013 @ 08:08 am PDT

How much time would you save if you didn't keep thinking about it and instead had a watch to remind you?

Jacked 14th October, 2013 @ 08:52 am PDT

I would rather have the watch tell me how many seconds I have already lived.

JimRD 14th October, 2013 @ 03:35 pm PDT

ha ha, brilliant concept

T N Args 14th October, 2013 @ 06:42 pm PDT

JimD makes a good point. Give people an option to view time to passing or time since creation. It would have a nice completeness about it for those glass half full or empty types.

Like the look of the thin, large white gummy watch and pixel multi line display.

They should make this into a nice normal watch, with the doom function as a secondary view for those that like it.

To be constructive, how about such a device that measures your body temperature, heart rate and proximate body fat (my scales do it by measuring conductivity between feet or something.

Then the cool thing would be if you get fit, your life expectancy would increase on the display. Get a beep and message flash one a week saying "5 years earned", or the other way if you are dropping the ball.

Wouldn't that be a treat !!

Nairda 14th October, 2013 @ 09:58 pm PDT

How many people will take out insurance on the basis of the display and hope to gloat if they 'outlive' the watch? Or is that questionaire similar to the one the insurance companies have already devised over many profitable years? After all, they don't give an overweight, 50 plus drinker (or smoker) the same odds as a 20 something fit teetotaller, now do they!